


The Brink

by Martin Iceworth (Iceworth)



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Affairs, Angst, Cheating, F/M, Romance, arrival
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-02
Updated: 2013-06-02
Packaged: 2017-12-13 17:13:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/826771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iceworth/pseuds/Martin%20Iceworth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hannah's daughter blew up a Mass Relay. Hannah may love her daughter, may love the Alliance, but love has never made her stupid. Not unless that love is for a certain turian.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Brink

Hannah Shepard didn’t think manors on the Citadel came this big. Her and Mark’s house on Earth had been smaller than the living room, the master bedroom dwarfed the four-poster bed inside, and the tub in the bathroom was large enough to teach a child to swim. After her bath, water rolled down her skin as she pulled on her dressing gown. She passed a fountain in the hallway and frowned at it.

At the desk in the study adjoined to the master bedroom, the computer beeped. Oops. 

Hannah sat down and pressed a green button. “How long have you been waiting?”

It was Sparatus’ face that appeared on the other side, taking her in. One mandible twitched, over and over.

Hannah narrowed her eyes at the turian expression. “Someone’s smug.”

“I haven’t been waiting long, I assumed you were exploring.” The twitch turned into a jerk, before the mandible went still. Spara tilted his head. “I see you’ve made use of the bathroom. _Without me._ ”

“Not that I’m ungrateful…” Hannah sprawled back in the chair.

“But…?” Spara’s mandible started twitching again. He was far too smug. And yet, the flicking looked forced, didn’t look involuntary…

There was something on his mind.

Hmm.

Hannah crossed one leg over the other. “It’s too big.”

The mandible jerked, and both of them lowered in the turian equivalent of a smile. Also, forced; much like a human smile, a real turian smile couldn’t be faked. A real turian smile didn’t completely reveal the teeth like that, and the backs of the mandibles would be upturned. “What’s wrong with it?”

“It’s huge.” Hannah folded her arms. “Isn’t the whole point of an illicit affair _not_ to attract attention?”

“This manor was confiscated from a drug lord who murdered thirteen of his allies in here before his arrest by C-Sec last week.” Spara mirrored her pose, reclining in his own chair. “The Council makes a habit of redistributing stolen assets. I made a bid for this one, it was accepted, and now it is mine to do as I see fit. And, I choose to give it to you.”

“So, a bunch of people died here. I didn’t _think_ that was modern art on the floor downstairs.” She arched an eyebrow as his mandible twitched, stopped, and started twitching again. “Spara.”

“Possessing the house does not put you in any danger.” The twitching stopped and restarted as Spara spoke. “All his allies are dead, none of his enemies know about it, the Council had a Spectre look into it before redistributing it to me. Security nearby was deliberately turned off and… won’t be turning on again, so no one will see you come or go, and no one will see _me_ come or go when I visit you.”

“Spara.”

“It’s a place for you to come to when you’re on leave, a home away from home. It’s big to maintain, I know. Don’t worry, I’ve got it taken care of, nobody will even know you were here, the servants will never come by when you’re on leave.”

“ _Spara_.”

He stopped. So did the twitching, again, and his face was neutral except for the subtle flare of his mandibles that revealed part of his teeth; a turian frown. Any farther and he’d be scowling. “Yes?” 

His voice said it all.

“You’re feeling guilty about something.” Hannah gave him her sternest frown. “Spill it.”

“It’s a gift,” he said too quickly.

“Spara. What have you done?”

Spara lowered his eyes, then. “You know I can’t talk about work.”

Oh, wow. “You must really have fucked over humanity in the latest treaty if you’re giving me a mansion.”

“Hannah.”

Humans had a saying — a picture means a thousand words. Sparatus said her name, and it could mean a thousand things. Hannah had loved deciphering the meanings over the years, using context and tone of voice to establish a dictionary in her mind where _Hannah_ meant everything from _I love you_ to _fucking stop that already_ or _I am going to fuck you senseless_. Right now, from the way he didn’t meet her eyes, from the timid tone of his voice, she knew her name meant, _please, don’t be like this_.

And she heard something else in there, too.

Hannah took a deep breath in through her nose. “My daughter’s been arrested for terrorism, hasn’t she?” 

Sparatus said nothing. Didn’t look at her.

Hannah stared at the synthetic grain in the desk. “I was wondering when it was going to happen.”

“Hannah…” _You know I can’t talk about this._

“She’s my daughter, Spara.”

“And yet,” he looked up at her at last. “You never got back in touch with her. Why was that?”

In front of Hannah’s mind’s eye, she saw a picture of a little girl. Five years old. On a missing poster. That same girl as an adult twenty four years later, her picture on a data pad as Sparatus held it out to her. _Is this Shepard your daughter, by any chance? She gets pissed off the same way you do; waves her arms around and shouts a lot._

She’d been involved with Spara for twenty two years, and had known her daughter only for five. But even then… Mark’s words reappeared in her head. _You’re never home, Hannah. Do you think I can do this alone? Handle this alone? You can’t just run away from this!_

“Don’t change the subject.” She narrowed her eyes at the webcam. “Spara. I never tell you anything classified about the Alliance, and you never tell me anything classified about the Hierarchy or the Council.”

“Exactly.”

“But something is obviously bothering you.” She sighed. Sat back in her chair again. Softened her voice. “We’ve known each other for… shit. Almost thirty years now.” Almost thirty years since he dragged her kicking and screaming from underneath a bed in an abandoned farm in Shanxi. “Spara, if you need to talk about it, you know you can trust me. I’m sure the kid can take care of herself, it’s her own damn fault she got involved with terrorists. But, fuck, it’s not like you to act like this.”

“You were in the process of moving in before she was arrested,” Spara said, guiltily. “In fact, as soon as you’re off leave, I’m sure you’ll find out about it.” Then his shoulders crumpled and he looked down again, sighing. “In fact, all you have to do is check the vids.”

“Spara. Tell me — “

Sparatus sighed again. “Your daughter blew up a mass relay.”

Silence.

Hannah said, “ _What_?”

“I said, she blew up a mass relay.”

“A… mass relay.”

“Yes.”

More silence.

“You mean, as in those things that send ships all over the galaxy?”

“Yes.”

“That are supposed to be indestructible?”

“Unless you throw a meteor at it.” Spara, with his dry, morbid humour. The two of them were a pair of sick fucks.

“So she didn’t even blow it up by _accident_?” Her heart seized in her chest. “Wait, I thought they’d destroy an entire system if they ever — “

Spara watched her.

Hannah stared back.

“ _Christ_.” Hannah held her head in her hands.  “Christ. _Christ_. Jesus _fuck_.”

“Three hundred thousand batarians are dead.” She heard Spara scrape his desk with his talons. “It could have been billions, Hannah.”

Hannah squeezed her eyes shut to stop the tears coming. If she’d reached out to her daughter, if she hadn’t been afraid, hadn’t been so apathetic, would this still have happened? Would she still have joined Cerberus? Spirits, Hannah was such a heartless _bitch_. Her remaining children all hated her, and with good reason. She was a bad mother. She was such a bad mother her children with her second husband saw more of the woman he cheated on her with as a mother than her. They hated her so much they were _relieved_ he cheated, and pissed off she wouldn’t tell anyone who _she_ cheated on him with.

She used to be a better mother, to Mark’s children, if not Arden’s. Then her little girl went missing and motherhood became more of a burden than it had ever been, a painful reminder of what she’d lost. Mark hated her, but it was him who’d been utterly useless when her world fell apart. Arden hated her, but he’d just been a jerkass, a hurried rebound because she’d become so fragile after losing her little girl that when she and Sparatus had broken up the first time for the sake of his damn career, she just needed _someone_ to cling to.

Thank fuck _that_ had gone down in flames.

“I never contacted her because she was an adult,” Hannah said. Fuck, her voice was choked with tears. “Because she was twenty nine. She’d had all those years to find me, but she never looked for me. If she’d wanted anything to do with me, she would have. She didn’t want anything to do with me, Spara. I tore Earth apart looking for her, but… she grew up without me. She was a Spectre. I’d have just looked like a leech, someone who didn’t give a fuck until she became famous. What was the point?”

Then she’d died. And Hannah had felt even more like a bitch because her death had made her feel _relieved_. Oh, except it turned out Shepard had faked her death or something so she could run away to help Cerberus, or whatever. That pilot had seen her get spaced, though, so Hannah wasn’t even sure what the hell had happened there. 

“Hannah.” _Please be okay._ Hannah looked up to see Spara watching her, his gaze so tender she couldn’t help but smile. She was the only one who got to see that look. As a politician, even Hannah thought he was unbearable, but as a person she couldn’t love anyone else more. “She’s been working with Cerberus, Hannah.” He spoke so gently to her that she felt a pang. She wanted him next to her. Usually he moved mountains to be with her on shore leave, but if the Commander had been apprehended, it was no wonder why he wasn’t with her. He was more of a husband than either Mark or Arden had ever been, but they could never marry. “You can’t be surprised she… well.” He shook his head. “No. Even I’m surprised she did this.”

“You gave her Spectre reauthorisation.”

“I know.” She saw it, then, a flash of guilt that was so hard to read on turian faces, but one she knew all-too well when it came to Sparatus.

She’d left him, briefly, for six months, but it had been the most hellish six months of both their lives. That was years ago now, before her supposedly-dead daughter reappeared just in time to be made the first human Spectre, but even now she still saw glimpses of the wound her departure had given him, and the guilty looks that he gave her when she knew he was thinking of how he could never be truly hers.

She’d give up everything for him, but he’d never do the same for her. The turian people wouldn’t stand for it. They’d never trust him again. And other people, strangers she’d never even met, would be dragged into it and suffer the consequences. _It’s naïve_ , he told her once, during the argument that split them up for the second time, _to think that I’m the only one who’d suffer if people found out. I wish, Hannah, I wish. If it were that simple I’d have told the galaxy about you years ago and taken the consequences. But I have a duty to my people, I have a duty to those whom I’m protecting with my silence. There are people, politicians who speak highly of me, and normal families and people who work their asses off on my behalf. Every single one of them would suffer if the public found out. Every interaction I have had with the Alliance would be rendered invalid, everyone would be afraid of bias, afraid that I could have leaked anything to humanity. I’m sorry._

He hadn’t believed it when she’d walked out. _Hannah?_ He’d said. _Hannah, you — you can’t —_

She did.

But he’d been right, in the end. She couldn’t. Six months later, she’d gotten back in touch with him, feeling like time and his absence — one she’d normally been able to cope with — had ripped open a hole in her life. He’d been bitter, angry, but… she was the only person who could ever thaw his anger, the only person who could ever calm him. She pushed past his reluctance and he welcomed her back, and clung tightly, and neither of them had let go since.

“You think this is a Cerberus terrorist attack?” Hannah looked back to the screen.

“That’s where it gets worse,” said Sparatus. “The Alliance claims that Shepard wasn’t part of Cerberus anymore when she did it.”

“Which would make it…” Oh. Fuck. _This_ was why Spara was so upset; it wasn’t the blown up relay, it wasn’t Cerberus, it was…

“Which would make it an Alliance attack,” said Sparatus. “Udina’s denying she was a part of the Alliance when it took place, and there’s rumours…” He shook his head. “You know I can’t tell you.”

_Rumours_ , he said. What he really meant was _we have spies giving us intel_. They both had spies in each other’s military, and they both knew it.

“Spara. You know I’d never tell them what you tell me.”

“I…”

“ _Spara_.”

“Hannah.” He sighed. He composed himself. Laced his fingers together, rested his chin on them. “The Alliance is keeping us in the dark. Anderson is going to resign any day now, I’m sure. There’s rumours Shepard _was_ in the destroyed on Alliance orders. Udina fends us off like we’re an enemy, and I don’t blame him. This is likely to see humanity thrown out of the Council, at the _least_. The batarians want war. And if the allegations prove to be correct, Citadel law states we’ll have to side with the batarians.”

_Fuck_. “But why? The batarians don’t even have an embassy here anymore.”

“Citadel law states that if a mass relay in any part of the galaxy is destroyed, the Council must classify the force that committed the crime as a threat to the entire galaxy, and take appropriate steps,” said Sparatus. “If Shepard was still with Cerberus when she did it, this wouldn’t be so bad because then we’d just take the fight to them, but if it comes out Shepard was a part of the Alliance at the time, all of humanity will have to pay the consequences.”

Hannah held her head in her hands. “ _Why_ did she destroy the relay?”

“You’re going to love this.” Sparatus flicked a mandible. More of his black humour. “She claimed it was to stop the Reapers.”

Hannah stared at him.

She slammed a fist into the table. Sparatus’ visage jumped and then came back into focus. “You have _got_ to be fucking kidding me!”

Sparatus shook his head, slowly.

“So where’s the evidence?” Hannah turned up her palms.

“Conveniently destroyed with the system.” Sparatus snorted. “Are you surprised? I’m not.”

Hannah snarled and threw her hands up in the air. She stormed out of her chair, started pacing the room. The webcam’s head followed her, keeping her in Spara’s view. “Is she fucking _incompetent_?”

“Hannah, I’ll be frank,” said Sparatus. “When it comes to Spectres, she’s one of the worst we’ve had so far. If it weren’t for the fact she was the first human Spectre and she’s somehow seen as a hero for what she did during the Geth attack, she’d been kicked out a long time ago. Spirits know _why_ she’s hailed as a hero for that, Hannah, all she did was clean up her own mess. She should have been held responsible for failure to apprehend Saren as she was ordered to, held responsible for all the deaths in the Citadel she did not prevent. If anything, the Alliance paid the price for her incompetence by sacrificing human lives to save the Citadel, but they still worship the ground she walks on. The Council’s already seen as an enemy, removing her would sour the fragile relationship humanity has with the community.” He shook his head. “I should never have reinstated her. So many times, Shepard has asked us to show faith in her.” He sneered. “The Alliance claim they don’t sanction Cerberus or their actions, but you bet if we refused to reinstate Shepard, there would have been a political shitstorm. We reinstated her because we were afraid of the backlash we’d get from the Alliance, and now three hundred thousand batarians are dead because of it. Because we lacked the courage to put her in her place. Three hundred thousand, dead for — for what? There’s no proof!”

“She’s a Spectre!” Hannah ranted. “It’s her _job_ to find evidence. She’s constantly on your back, screaming at you for being _oh-so-nasty_ for daring not to take her outlandish claims at face value! It’s _her_ fucking job, not yours, she’s the one out on the field uncovering all this supposed evidence, for fuck’s sake and yet she never has a shred. Jesus fucking _Christ_ , she’d never have had that evidence against Saren if she hadn’t accidentally run across it!” 

She whirled to face Spara. “She’s an infiltrator, Spara, us infiltrators are supposed to have technical expertise. Did you know the quarian who was on her squad was the one who actually _had_ that evidence against Saren? Did you know she was on her pilgrimage?” She sneered. “That’s right, Spara, my daughter had evidence against Saren because she accidentally ran into a _child_ who was better at this than her! She’s a blight on humanity, she is the worst Spectre I’ve ever heard of, and frankly, she is a complete and utter embarrassment to the Alliance. ‘The disgraced Commander Shepard’ doesn’t even cut it.” She sank into her chair. “God. I don’t even know anymore.”

“Hannah,” said Sparatus. “I think there may be some truth to her claims.”

Hannah stared at him. “What?”

“But,” said Sparatus. “If my calculations are correct, then the implications are outright disturbing.”

“Tell me.” Spirits, she wished he was there right now, in front of her. She wanted to touch him so badly.

“The Alliance are protecting her,” said Sparatus. “They believe her claims. They always have.”

Hannah felt a pit open up in her stomach. “But they wouldn’t believe her unless…”

“Unless there was evidence,” said Sparatus. “I find it hard to believe that even the Alliance would just take her word for it. No, they must have evidence.”

“So they’re…” Fuck. This was bad. “… Hiding it from the rest of the galaxy.”

“Yes. I believe so.”

And some people wondered why Sparatus hated the Alliance. Hannah slammed two fists on the desk. “So they think there’s a fucking apocalypse coming and they hide the proof? _What the fuck is wrong with them?”_ She held her head in her hands. Took a shuddering breath. “Thirty years in the galactic community and we’ve already fucked ourselves and everyone over.”

“Humanity is impossible to work with.” Sparatus sighed. “How can they expect us to take action if they won’t give us this proof? Do they really expect us to rally all the fleets just because they _say_ so?”

“My people are arrogant.” Hannah snarled. “They think that if they say jump, you should ask how high. They think that they have more of a right to be a leader in a community they’ve barely been a part of for thirty years over species who have been in it for hundreds of them, and then they throw a tantrum about how nasty you are for rightfully pointing out they know jack shit. They’re fucking arrogant.” She forced herself to take a deep breath. “They’re going to ruin us all.” Her voice almost broke. “Spara.”

“I’m going to come over, alright?” said Spara.

“Don’t they need you?”

“This is humanity’s mess, frankly, not mine. And I’m more concerned that…” He paused. Took a deep breath. “Hannah, whether or not the Reapers are real, if things keep going down the path they’re going… we might not get to see each other for a long time. Maybe not even again. This is big, this is bad.”

“You think it might come to war?”

“It’s likely,” said Sparatus. “Very likely. If your damn Alliance doesn’t come up with the proof we need that Commander Shepard’s actions were to save more lives than were taken, if they don’t hand her over, if they continue to defend her and hide her from us — we will have absolutely no choice but to disown humanity, and treat them as a galactic threat. The only way the Alliance can salvage this is by either coming up with the evidence or by extraditing her, and I don’t think either’s going to happen any time soon. Udina’s been buying time, and we’ve secretly given the Alliance some shadow ops to investigate their claims and come up with the evidence, so at least they’re cooperating a little — I don’t want war, Hannah. Nobody wants war. Even if I didn’t have you, I don’t want war, I want to avoid it at all costs.”

“And if it does come to war…”

Sparatus looked at her sadly. He didn’t say anything.

He didn’t need to.

“Come home,” she told him. “Please. I need you.”

 

-O-

 

If he looked tired over the comm link, he looked worse when he came home. His mandibles were tense with fatigue, and when she stepped closer he took her in an embrace that was too tight, too desperate.

She returned it, and buried her face in his neck and cowl. She took in his scent, so alien and yet so familiar. Her grip on him tightened. She felt him hide his face in her hair. One hand ran down her spine, soothing, although whether it was meant to soothe her or him she couldn’t tell.

“I’m sorry, Hannah,” he croaked.

“I’m sorry,” she answered. So many _what ifs?_ ran through her head. What if the police had been able to find her children? What if she’d gotten back in touch with the Commander and not let her fear hold her back? What if she’d tried harder to find her?

His hand rubbed the back of her neck. Fingered her hair. 

Suddenly she needed him, desperately. She pawed at his clothing, tugged at the fabric. He understood and nibbled her neck. He slipped a hand up her shirt, pressed her to the wall and had her there. Her legs fit perfectly in the space above his hips, her arms were at home wrapped around his neck, and when he entered her she whimpered — whether in need or fear, she couldn’t tell. After she shuddered in her climax, he brushed away the tears with the pad of a thumb and held her there for a long moment, nuzzling her face.

When he set her down again she busied herself with the catch of her pants, the buttons of the shirt she tugged back into place, and she couldn’t look at him. She followed him into the new, spacious living room which felt too large to be friendly, especially now. When he sank into the sofa she curled up beside him and leaned against him, afraid to let go. Shifted, restlessly. Into his lap, out of it. He stilled her by urging her to lie down with her head on top of his thighs as his fingers stroked her hair and ran over the shell of her ear, over her neck and down an arm, over and over.

“I hate this,” she said. “I hate being so at the mercy of everyone else. I hate how every time I think it’ll be okay, that our relationship might one day be accepted, something like this happens.”

“Three hundred thousand batarians died, Hannah,” he reminded her gently, and she felt guilt slide a knife into her chest. 

“I know.” She tried not to sound like she was about to cry — even Sparatus thought she cried too much, cried too easily — but her voice choked between words and she turned her face away. But however frayed his temper might have been in the vids, it was limitless when it came to her, and he stroked her cheek and neck. “I just — I — “

“I know.” She heard the despair in his voice. “I know, Hannah.” His talons curled tight in her hair. “I know.”


End file.
